"What did I miss? What didn't I do that I needed to be doing?" O'Dell said she had to ask herself. "That was a hard pill for me to swallow."

She initially announced both schools would close, but in the end, only the Globe campus closed.

O'Dell scrubbed the staff and started anew. The Payson campus was not plagued by the same problems.

Immediately after the schools closed, O'Dell said area residents and members from the law enforcement community encouraged her to re-open.

Gila County has one of the highest drop out rates in the state. The need for an alternative school was undeniable, O'Dell said.

She decided on sweeping changes to avoid future problems.

"Changing culture is difficult," she said.

A new superintendent for the regional school district will relieve O'Dell of the district's minutia. She plans to form a five-member advisory board, which will function as the regional district's governing body.

New staff at the Globe campus and a new business administrator will complete the team.

Charged with change, Dan Bradfield will serve as the Globe campus' new principal. He will also be the new superintendent for the Gila County Regional School District, a newly created position.

"We're going to be known as the explorers," he said Wednesday. "Space explorers, that is."

"We're going to do everything to take the kids out of this world because they haven't been successful in this world."

The idea behind Bradfield's non-traditional approach to education is that the absence of gravity renders all objects equal.

He wants students to feel ownership in their school and give them responsibility so they can learn how to deal with it, and build "intrinsic motivation."

"Education, in my mind, has never taught kids to think well. They know how to take orders," Bradfield said.

He plans on reward programs for reading, credit recovery and attendance, and he will also solicit community support -- not necessarily monetary --hrough a Gila County Mission Control Team to create a culture of ownership and responsibility.

"I know we're going to have doubters," Bradfield said. "Can we reach them (the students) all? Absolutely not. Can they reach them all in a traditional school? No. That's why we have these."

Bradfield's $68,000 salary will cover his duties in both positions, which O'Dell said the district has enough money to pay.

By hiring Bradfield, O'Dell can concentrate more on her duties as the county superintendent. Those include fiscal management, overseeing education for juvenile delinquents and helping to school jail inmates.